No More Tears In The End

hing else let me know.”

“I will,” Tamia promised and hung up the phone.

I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep when I heard somebody knocking on my door. I thought about ignoring it, but got up anyway. I got my gun and went to the door. I was about to see who it was when I heard the key hit the lock.

The door opened and Wanda stepped in.

“Hello.”

Wanda jumped. “You scared me.” Then she saw the gun. “Were you gonna shoot me?”

“Yes,” I said and turned around and headed back to bed.

“You all right?”

“Just tired,” I told her and got back under the covers.

“Too bad,” Wanda said and began getting undressed. “You been with Mike all day?”

“No. I took some money to Mrs. Phillips. I spent the day lookin’ into the murder at Paradise. I was with him most of the night. ”

“Did Mike ask you what you wanted to do?”

“I told him that I was thinkin’ about runnin’ the game.”

Wanda frowned. “What did he say?”

“Black said to give Jackie a chance; Said she got Travis up there now.”

“What good does he think Travis being there, knowing less about the game than she does, is gonna accomplish?” Wanda asked, questioning Black’s logic.

“Security. I didn’t ask him. He wants me to check on them every night.”

“Just the game?”

“No, Black wants me to check on everything.”

“Anything else he want you to do?” Wanda asked without commenting on what I had just told her-which surprised me. Maybe she didn’t understand what everything meant. But knowing Wanda, she just wanted to know everything before she said anything about it.

“No, that’s it.”

“Okay,” she said and headed for the shower.

Once she got out of the shower and dried off, she got in bed. When Wanda rolled close to me and kissed me, I thought we were getting ready to have sex, but Wanda had other ideas. “I have to be honest with you, I’m not sure I like the idea of you checking on everything.”

Now it comes.

“I didn’t think you would.”

Wanda rolled her eyes at me. “I mean, I can see where this is goin’.”

“Where do you see it goin’?”

“He’s got you taking money to that family, something Freeze used to do. You’re going to start making the rounds every night, something Freeze used to do. Black wants you to take over.”

“That’s exactly what he wants. But you have a problem with it?”

“Frankly: yes. Yes, I do. You know that I think that we need to be moving away from all that, not have you move into Freeze’s spot. But I guess Black has other ideas about what we should be doing.” She folded her arms across her chest.